5.  The applicant was born in 1958 and lives in Dnipropetrovsk, Ukraine.
6.  The applicant was the Vice-President, founder and majority shareholder of the Bank Slavyansky (hereinafter – the Bank). On 2 February 2000 the State Tax Police instituted criminal proceedings into tax evasion by the management of the Bank.
7.  On 10 March 2000 the State Tax Administration instituted another set of criminal proceedings for abuse of office by the management of the Bank.
8.  On 13 March 2000 the applicant was arrested and detained first in the temporary detention centre (the ITU) and then in the pre-trial detention centre (the SIZO) (see below the part on the applicant's pre-trial detention).
9.  On 14 March 2000 criminal proceedings were instituted against the applicant for abuse of office with particularly aggravated consequences.
10.  On the same day the State Tax Administration issued a press release, the relevant extract of which reads as follows:
“...During the investigation into a criminal case concerning financial fraud related to the transfer of significant funds abroad, it was established that the founders and chairpersons of the Bank Slavyansky had abused their power and had increased the interest rates on their and their relatives' deposit accounts....
... The activities of the above persons were aimed at artificially decreasing the Bank's income, which would make it possible to pay less taxes to the State Budget.... All these funds were redistributed by the bankers among a narrow circle of chairpersons who were, in fact, the real owners of the Bank...”
11.  In April 2000 the Ukrainian News Agency “UNIAN” provided information about the session of the Coordinating Committee on Combating Corruption and Organised Crime. The relevant extract reads:
“It is a matter of honour for the General Prosecutor's Office and the State Tax Administration to bring the story of the Bank Slavyansky to a logical conclusion” – said the President of Ukraine during his speech at the session... He stated that the chairpersons of the Bank had turned it into a source of uncontrolled personal income. “Such money-makers have powerful patrons, and there is great pressure on the investigation”, - mentioned the President.”
12.  These statements were reproduced by several Ukrainian newspapers – Pravda Ukrainy, no. 61, 25 April 2000; Kyivskie Vedomosti, no. 90, 22 April 2000; Galitski Kontrakty, no. 36, September 2001.
13.  On 18 April, 2 and 16 June 2000 the Tax Police instituted three more sets of criminal proceedings against the applicant and subsequently joined all these criminal cases against the applicant together.
14.  On 21 August 2000 the applicant was formally charged with tax evasion, abuse of power, embezzlement and bribery.
15.  On 1 February 2001 the investigation in the case was completed.
16.  In April 2001 the Radio Svoboda web-site made available recordings of conversations which had allegedly taken place between the President of Ukraine, Mr Kuchma, and the Head of the State Tax Administration, Mr M. A. There recordings were provided by Mr Melnychenko, who claimed to have made them using a digital recorder placed under the sofa in the office of the President of Ukraine[1]. According to these records, the criminal proceedings against the applicant and the activities of his lawyers were being closely monitored and an arrangement had been made to secure the applicant's conviction by changing the territorial jurisdiction of the case to courts in which the applicant had no connections and could not interfere with the proceedings; accordingly, the jurisdiction of the Artemivskiy Local Court of Lugansk and the Lugansk Regional Court of Appeal had been arranged following discussions with the Deputy President of the Supreme Court of Ukraine, the presidents of the above courts and other judges.
17.  On 12 July 2001 the pre-trial investigation was resumed for one day to include additional materials.
18.  On 13 July 2001 the pre-trial investigation was completed and the applicant was given access to three additional volumes of the case-file.
19.  On 1 November 2001 the investigator rejected a motion by the applicant, who already had several lawyers, to appoint one more lawyer, Mrs K.
20.  On 5 November 2001 the Deputy Prosecutor General referred the case to the Supreme Court of Ukraine. The Deputy President of the Supreme Court of Ukraine referred the case to the Lugansk Regional Court of Appeal, which in its turn referred it to the Artemivsky Local Court of Lugansk (“the Artemivsky Court) for examination on the merits. According to the applicant he was not informed about the reasons or legal grounds for choosing the territorial jurisdiction of his case.
21.  On 10 December 2001 the trial proceedings commenced. During the hearings the applicant and his lawyers unsuccessfully challenged the judges of the court on numerous occasions (31 January, 1 February, 22 February, 8 April 2002).
22.  On 6 February 2002 the prosecutor requested the court to deprive the applicant and his lawyers of the right to lodge motions. He maintained that they had been lodging multiple motions, all of which had been rejected in any case, and that the further examination of such motions would therefore be a waste of time. The court allowed this request.
23.  On 18 February 2002 the weekly newspaper Business published an interview with the Presiding Judge L., the relevant extract of which reads as follows:
“...The lawyers had a hundred motions! And when, so to speak, we were “fed up” with them – we “hurled them back” in some way and said: that's enough!”
Business: Does a court have a right to forbid the lodging of motions in this way? L.: No, it hasn't. But the trial is [following] a certain sequence, and if one of the stages is delayed and thus the truth is not being established, but its establishment is being obstructed ... we can, roughly speaking, “throw” the lawyers out of the proceedings, but we do not do that. We only stopped their “logorrhoea” and started the trial...”
24.  According to the applicant's submissions, Judge L. also forbade lawyers to communicate with the applicant in the court room, whereas they were able to communicate with him fully in the SIZO.
25.  On 8 April 2002 Presiding Judge L. interrupted the lawyer F.'s speech for the defence, which had lasted since 22 March 2002 in seven consecutive hearings, and forbade him to continue it. He considered that this speech was no longer defensive, but “was political and only contained criticism of the authorities”.
26.  On 9 April 2002 the court deprived three of the other lawyers, Mr P, Mr A. and Mrs Y., of the possibility of delivering their speeches for the defence.
27.  The applicant pronounced his final pleadings from 11 to 17 April 2002 in six consecutive hearings. On 17 April 2002 the court interrupted him and prohibited him from finishing his plea. The court noted that despite two warnings on 11 and 15 April 2002 the applicant had continued to abuse his right to a last plea by repeating his previous arguments, reading out paragraphs from law textbooks, expressing negative remarks and threats in respect of the investigators, making political statements and claiming that his case had been specially mounted. The court also expelled the applicant from the court room.
28.  On 19 April 2002 the Artemivskiy Court convicted the applicant of tax evasion and embezzlement by abuse of power and sentenced him to nine years' imprisonment. This judgment was challenged before the Lugansk Regional Court of Appeal.
29.  During a press conference on 16 May 2002 Mr M. A. announced that the audio recordings allegedly made in the President's Office (see paragraph 16 above) were false and had been forged at the applicant's instructions. On 16 October 2002 Mr Melnychenko wrote a letter to the Kyiv Shevchenkivskiy District Court (“the Shevchenkivskiy Court”) and the Head of the Temporary Investigative Commission of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, denying Mr M. A.'s accusations and confirming the authenticity of these recordings. He also stated that he had never met the applicant or received any order on his behalf.
30.  On 28 August 2002 the applicant's lawyer challenged the judges of the appellate court.
31.  The same day the applicant's lawyer F. was stopped by the tax police while driving a car belonging to a Mr K. According to the Government this measure was taken in the context of criminal proceedings instituted against the above-mentioned Mr K. on 9 April 2002 and in accordance with a seizure order issued by the tax police on 15 April 2002. According to the applicant, the police took the materials of the file concerning his case from lawyer F. The Government denied this latter contention.
32.  On 3 September 2002 the hearings before the Lugansk Regional Court of Appeal (“the Lugansk Court”) took place without the applicant's lawyers Mr F. and Mr A., although the applicant and his lawyer P., who was present, insisted on their participation. The Court of Appeal also denied the applicant's right to a final plea.
33.  On 14 September 2002 the Lugansk Court upheld the judgment with minor changes and found no procedural breaches in the proceedings before the first-instance court. By a separate ruling the court noted that the applicant's lawyers A. and F. had been breached the code of ethics for lawyers.
34.  On 10 March 2004 the Supreme Court of Ukraine acquitted the applicant of tax evasion, but upheld his conviction for embezzlement by abuse of power. The Supreme Court reduced his sentence to five years' imprisonment. The court found no procedural violations in the proceedings before the lower courts.
35.  On 13 March 2000 the applicant was arrested on suspicion of tax evasion. In particular, he was suspected of under-reporting the income of the “Ibris Ltd”, where he also worked at that time as a General Director. He had allegedly obtained a bank credit and failed to include the amount of this credit in the company's gross income for the purpose of the tax declaration. The reason given for the applicant's arrest was the risk of his absconding and obstructing the course of justice.
36.  On 14 March 2000 the Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine ordered the applicant's detention on remand on the ground that the applicant was suspected of a serious crime and there were grounds to believe that he might abscond or obstruct the course of justice. The applicant's detention was extended on successive occasions by the Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine – to four months on 11 May 2000; to six months on 12 July 2000, to nine months on 13 September 2000 and to twelve months on 20 November 2000 on the ground that he was suspected of serious crimes and could abscond.
37.  On 16 May 2000 the Kyiv Pecherskiy District Court (“the Pecherskiy Court”) dismissed the applicant's application for release, lodged by his lawyer on 17 March 2000. The court decided that the detention order was well-founded and made in accordance with law. This ruling was not subject to appeal.
38.  On 23 March 2001 the applicant lodged an application for release with the Shevchenkivskiy Court. On 27 April 2001 the court dismissed this request, having found that on 1 February 2001 the pre-trial investigation had been completed, the applicant and thirteen co-accused had been given access to the case-file and the period for consulting the case materials was still ongoing. On 13 June 2001 the Kyiv City Court upheld the ruling of 27 April 2001 on cassation. However, on 30 May 2002 the Supreme Court quashed the decisions of the lower courts under the new cassation procedure and referred the matter for fresh consideration to the first-instance court. The Supreme Court found that the lower courts had not decided on what grounds the applicant was to remain in custody after the period of his detention under the prosecutors' orders had expired.
39.  On 16 August 2001 the Shevchenkivskiy Court dismissed the applicant's application for release, lodged on 6 August 2001.
40.  On 21 August 2001 the Pecherskiy Court allowed the applicant's application for release, lodged on 3 August 2001. The court found that since the pre-trial investigation had been resumed on 12 July 2001, the duration of the applicant's pre-trial detention had to be extended by the Supreme Court. As the investigative authorities had failed to seek such an extension, the applicant's further detention was unlawful and the applicant had to be immediately released.
41.  On 22 August 2001 the applicant, who was about to leave the SIZO, was apprehended again, following an investigator's order within the framework of another criminal case which had been instituted against him and was later joined to the initial case.
42.  On 23 August 2001 an investigator of the State Tax Administration requested the Shevchenkivskiy Court to order the applicant's detention on remand. The investigator referred to the seriousness of the charges against the applicant and the risk of his absconding. In particular, the request stated:
“During the pre-trial investigation Mr Feldman expressed his mistrust in the Ukrainian law-enforcement bodies and courts on several occasions, and maintained that his case ought to be examined by the European Court alone, and that for this purpose he had to be outside Ukraine...”
43.  On 24 August 2001 the Shevchenkivskiy Court extended the period of the applicant's detention until 2 September 2001.
44.  On 28 August 2001 the Kyiv Court of Appeal quashed the decision of 21 August 2001 (see paragraph 40 above) on the ground that despite the fact that the prosecutors had extended the applicant's pre-trial detention for twelve months the prosecution had taken only ten months and seventeen days for the investigation. Therefore, in the court's opinion, the reopening of the investigation for one day did not require any new decision on the applicant's detention.
45.  On 3 September 2001 the Business weekly newspaper published an interview with Mr P., the Head of the Investigation Department of the State Tax Administration. The relevant extract reads as follows:
“Why are Feldman and others detained today? Because Feldman stressed on several occasions that he did not trust Ukrainian justice. He considers that in Ukraine he will not have a fair trial. If he does not trust Ukrainian justice, he will try to find another system. Which one? Outside Ukraine? So how we can release him?”
46.  On 19 September 2001 the Shevchenkivskiy Court, following a complaint by the applicant, found that the applicant's arrest on 22 August 2001 had been unlawful. The court established that there had been no legal grounds for such an arrest and that the suspicion of the applicant's absconding abroad had been unsubstantiated. The court, however, refused to allow the applicant's claim for immediate release for lack of jurisdiction. This decision was overruled by the Kyiv City Court of Appeal on 1 October 2001. The appellate court found that the applicant's arrest on 22 August 2001 had been lawful.
47.  On 25 September 2001 the Pecherskiy Court examined the applicant's complaint against the prosecutor's detention order of 14 March 2000 and terminated the proceedings on the ground that the same issue had been resolved in the decision of the same court of 16 May 2000.
48.  On 26 September 2001 the Pecherskiy Court considered the applicant's complaint against the General Prosecutor's Office and the administration of SIZO no. 13 in Kyiv concerning his unlawful detention from 31 August 2001 onwards. The court rejected part of this complaint for lack of jurisdiction. On 27 September 2001 the Pecherskiy Court considered the remainder of the complaint and found for the applicant. It acknowledged the unlawfulness of the applicant's detention from 31 August 2001 onwards on the ground that there was no court decision authorising the applicant's detention. The court ordered the SIZO to release the applicant immediately but this decision was not enforced (see next paragraph) and was later overruled by the Kyiv Court of Appeal on 22 November 2001 on the ground that the first-instance court had applied the provisions of civil and criminal law together. The decision of the Court of Appeal was also quashed in its turn by the Supreme Court on 6 November 2002. The case was remitted for a fresh consideration on appeal. On 14 November 2003 the Court of Appeal quashed the decision of the first-instance court and issued a new decision rejecting the applicant's complaint against the administration of the SIZO. On 17 March 2005 the Supreme Court quashed the decision of the Court of Appeal of 14 November 2003 and upheld the decision of the Pecherskiy Court of 27 September 2001.
49.  Following the judgment of the Pecherskiy Court of 27 September 2001 ordering the applicant's immediate release (see previous paragraph), the Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine issued on the same day the “Prescription on elimination of breaches of law” („Припис про усунення порушень закону”), requesting the State Penitentiary Department not to allow the applicant's release from detention on the basis of the above Pecherskiy Court's decision, stating that this decision was unlawful. The applicant was not released and the same day an investigator of the State Tax Administration requested another local court - the Shevchenkivskiy Court to order the applicant's detention on remand. The investigator referred again to the risk of the applicant's absconding abroad, formulated in the same way as the request of 23 August 2001. On the same day the Shevchenkivskiy Court extended the period of the applicant's detention until 7 October 2001.
50.  On 12 December 2001 the trial proceedings commenced and the Artemivskiy Court upheld the applicant's detention on remand, referring to the seriousness of the charges against him.
51.  On 1 February 2002 the court further rejected requests for release lodged by the applicant's representative during the court hearings.
52.  In the context of civil proceedings to which one of the applicant's companies was a party, the Tax Administration lodged on 25 January 2007 a request for renewal of the time-limit to appeal against the decision of 30 December 2004, of which it was allegedly not aware. The court allowed the request on 31 January 2007. The applicant considered the renewal as an attempt to exert pressure on him for lodging applications with the Court.